Page:The Proletarian Revolution in Russia - Lenin, Trotsky and Chicherin - ed. Louis C. Fraina (1918).djvu/143

 exposing the miserable lies which he is spreading while toadying to all the Sudekums.

Regarding the relations between "the proletarian masses" and "a handful of parliamentarisms," Kautsky advances one of the most threadbare arguments:

"Let us not speak of the German Socialists, so that we shall not seem to be pleading our own cause; but who would seriously pretend that men like Vaillant and Guesde, Hyndman and Plekhanov turned imperialists all of a sudden and betrayed Socialism?

Let us leave aside the parliamentarians and "competent parties" (Kautsky obviously alludes to the flood of deserved scorn which the magazine Internationale published by Rosa Luxemburg and Franz Mehring poured upon the "competent parties," that is the leaders of the German Social-Democratic party, its executive committee, its parliamentary faction, etc., "Who would pretend that four millions of class-conscious German proletarians would at the call of a handful of parliamentarians make in twenty four hours a complete round about face to the right, and turn their backs upon all their previous aims. If that was true, it would show the terrible failure, not only of our party, but of the masses (italics mine). If the masses are so completely lacking in character then we might as well go and bury ourselves." (page 274.)

Karl Kautsky the great political and scientific authority had, for that matter, already buried himself under a mound of lamentable evasions. Whoever fails to see this is hopeless as a Socialist; the only attitude to assume toward Kautsky is the infinite scorn which Rosa Luxemburg, Franz Mehring and other contributors to the Internationale expressed toward him.

Just think: in regard to the war, the only people who could express themselves with a certain freedom (that is because they had not been seized and led to the barracks, and were not in immediate danger of being shot) were exclusively that "handful of parliamentarians" (they could vote freely, they could vote against the war, for even in Russia a man did not get beaten, nor threatened, nor arrested for that) and a handful of officials and journalists. Now Kautsky blames the masses for all the treachery and lack of character of that group of the population, which Kautsky himself had for many years described as being bound up with the tactics and the ideology of opportunism.

The first and fundamental rule of scientific research in general, and of Marxian discussion in particular, is to examine closely the relations between the present strife among the various Socialist